GALESBURG — The upcoming election between Democratic U.S. Rep. Cheri Bustos and her Republican opponent, Bobby Schilling of Colona, has national implications after the two duked it out two years ago.

Bustos of East Moline ousted Schilling in the 2012 election in a tight battle that has set the stage for an even bigger sequel this year.

The race already has received national attention with newly elected House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy stepping in to support Schilling. The new leader will appear with Schilling at an event Sunday in Peoria.

It appears Schilling’s campaign will look to veterans’ affairs as a potential issue to use to defeat Bustos.

Schilling is hoping to stack his congressional track record up against that of Bustos’, who didn’t have a voting history the last time these two met.

“We’re going to contrast the difference between the two terms,” Schilling said. “A prime example is, we didn’t wait five months before an election to hold veterans’ forums. We did it from the get-go.”

Bustos has made it a point to broadcast her work with local veterans, but she said it’s not a political strategy, and she doesn’t appear to be ready to engage in the political scuffle with Schilling just yet.

“In my short time in office, I have made veterans a top priority, not only in Washington, but with the day-to-day service we give to our constituents here in Illinois,” she said in an email. “My office recently hosted a veterans’ benefits workshop to connect veterans who have questions with expert caseworkers from the VA and other organizations that serve the heroes in our communities.”

Bustos has not addressed Schilling’s criticism directly, nor has she indicated an interest at calling out the GOP candidate on his congressional track record with veterans’ affairs. However, Schilling has made it a point to call out Bustos and her track record whenever he has the chance, notably criticizing her for her ‘yes’ vote on the Patty Murray, D-Washington, and Paul Ryan, R-Wisconsin, federal budget that Schilling said took billions of dollars away from veterans.

“Bobby Schilling never voted to cut veteran benefits,” he said. “Cheri Bustos voted to cut $6 billion from disabled veterans and their families.”

But Bustos said she’s focused on helping veterans find jobs after their time in the service by introducing legislation like the “Jobs for Heroes Act,” which helps make veterans a better option for employers by giving them a tax break for every veteran hired.

The proposal was introduced last December, but has not made any progress since.

Schilling is excited about his own proposal, which he helped draft before Bustos defeated him in the 2012 election. His plan would allow veterans to use their own doctors and hospitals instead of VA facilities. The plan passed both houses of Congress and is on President Barack Obama’s desk, waiting to be signed into law.

Schilling said he drafted the bill when he was in Congress, and points to it as proof that he’s been on veterans’ side “from day one.”

“The key thing here is if you allow them to go directly to the doctor or hospital the sooner the better, because it takes the load off the VA,” Schilling said last month. “With all of the veterans coming out of Iraq and Afghanistan, you’ve got a lot of the Vietnam guys, you know every war that we’ve ever had, but these last two wars have really been over-burdening the system, and that’s why it would be a good idea to have this bill.”

Despite the success his proposed legislation has had, Schilling wants to eliminate a 40-day waiting period in the approved plan he said that was added after he was booted from Congress.

“The local facilities are in pretty good shape,” he said. “The problem lies if someone needs something at, say the Iowa City hospital, where the hospital might not get to it in the 40 days.”

Bustos agreed with Schilling about the local VA facilities and said the facilities are doing well in the wake of the scandal that cost Eric Shinseki his job as the head of the Department of Veterans Affairs.

Shinseki lost his job after reports of mismanagement came out of a Phoenix VA hospital, putting the whole system under scrutiny.

Bustos said for the Galesburg clinic and the other VA facilities in the district, things are fine. She believes the problem lies with the system, not the individual hospitals and clinics.